Jackson, MS

I'm in Jackson, MS.  I had a reading at Lemuria Books.  Earlier in the day, I did an interview for Don't Lecture Me, which is a "web series featuring fascinating interviews with persons of note."  I talked to Karen Hearn, who was very nice and had good questions, though I, for some reason, felt the need to spend way too much time talking about how desperately lonely I was for a good portion of my life.  Still, it was fun and I'm interested to see how they edit it to make it look like I wasn't, every fifteen seconds, shocked by the fact that the camera was focused on me and then very quickly staring at some distant point in space.

The reading was a little weird.  No one came.  Actually, my friend Mary Elizabeth, who is awesome, and her husband, Patrick, and their nine-month-old son, Jack, came.  And my dad was there.  No one else came.  One of the employees asked if I still wanted to read.  I said, "I guess not."  Mary Elizabeth said that I should read.  The other employees said that I should read.  Jack seemed like he wouldn't have minded if I had opted not to read so that he could go home.  So I sat about two feet away from everyone and read two very short pieces.  It wasn't too bad.  Thanks to Mary Elizabeth for coming and to the Lemuria booksellers, Emily and Kelly and Lisa and Joe, for being so nice to me.  

My dad and I had planned to stop in Tuscaloosa on the way to Jackson so we could eat at Archibald's Barbecue.  We had talked about it for almost two straight hours.  Then we got there and found out they were closed on Mondays.  My dad made me stand in front of Archibald's while he took a photo.  A group of construction workers across the street stopped working to watch this happen.

Tomorrow I'm off to Greenwood, MS, to read at TurnRow Book Company.  I'm hoping I can eat some rib tips at Spooney's Bar-Be-Que and pie at the Crystal Grill.